Gerald Massey's Lectures - Society in evolution - Awardspace

If so, these would be manipulated by his followers, one of whom, James, is said, in the
book Abadazurah, to have been a follower of Jehoshua the Nazarene, and so by degrees
the historic Joshua would be confused with, and finally converted into, Jesus the Christ of
Nazareth, and the mystical Sayer into the Word made flesh: the Jesus of that "other
Gospel" which was opposed by Paul. The sayings themselves, selected in a last
assortment, have not even the consistency of a kaleidoscope. They will not fall into any
set form of themselves, or reflect any mental unity anywhere. And so each sect or system
of interpretation has to take them and construct its own kaleidoscope, and determine its
own views, doing all it can to impose them upon others. Texts may be quoted on all sides
for purposes the most antagonistic. Diversity radiates outwardly from them because there
was no unity of origin, no individual life at the heart of them all.
When our missionaries first made the sayings known to the Arawaks of Guiana, they
remarked, "The word is good but we knew most of it before." Most of the true sayings
were known before! As we have them they are so various--good, bad, and indifferent--as
to constitute that hybrid mixture which is certain to entail sterility. Some of the sayings
are no more appropriate to our human wants than was the old lady's tract on the sin of
dancing, which she offered to a poor fellow who had to hobble about on two wooden legs
and crutches! "If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out!" Of what value is such advice as
that? Also, it is impossible for us to love our enemies, if it were right to do so; and, as has
been said, it would be wrong to do it if it were possible. "Blessed are they who have not
seen yet have believed." Why, tyranny could devise no doctrine that could be turned to
more fatal account! "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for their's is the kingdom of heaven."
Do you call the teaching of that saying divine? I think it would be false and fraudulent if
uttered by a voice from the Infinite with all heaven for its mouthpiece! The poor in spirit
are the accursed, the outcasts, and pariahs of the earth; those who sink into the squalor
and crawl in the filthy dens of poverty, to become the natural victims of all its parasites of
prey. The poor in spirit are the prematurely old men, weary, worn-out women, and
wizened children, all bleaching into a ghastly white in the chilling shadow of daily want!
The poor in spirit are those who crouch and offer their backs to the whip, who remain
bowed just as they were bent, and allow their hands to be fettered and held fast in the
attitude of prayer, when they ought to be up and striking. They who are content to crawl
like caterpillars, and be trodden as caterpillars underfoot. Poverty of spirit is the very
devil; the source of half the evil extant; most of the meannesses in human nature may be
traced to poverty of spirit! It dwarfs the mental stature of men, makes them bow the neck,
and creep and grovel for a little gain, or go down on all fours in the dirt, as beasts in
human form, from lack of spirit enough to stand erect! The poor in spirit dare not think
for themselves, or utter what they think! They only wonder what other folk will think!
They who are only mere preliminary people that go monkeying round under the pretence
of being women and men! In this world of struggle, this scene of survival for the fittest,
the poor in spirit stand no chance, and find no place; there is no victory for those who
fight no battle. And as to heaven--do you really think heaven is a harbour of refuge for
the poor in spirit and the area-sneaks of earth? The poor and needy, the hungry and
suffering, are not the blessed, and no assumption of divine authority on the part of the
sayer will ever make them so. These beatitudes are not divine revelations, they are only
the false promises of the priests, who were the crafty founders of the faith, made
comfortable to Roman rule.
One very striking note of the want of human personality and historic verity in the Christ
of the canonical Gospels is the absence of all recognition of Rome. There is no shadow of
Rome to be seen on the face of the Christ; no word of rebuke for her inhuman and nonnatural
crimes; no sign of anything contemporary: except the counselling of submission
to Cæsar. The slave would look in vain to the sayings of Jesus for any denunciation of
slavery. There is not one word of condemnation for the oppressors, nor of comfort for the